In recent years, there has been a desire for more environmentally friendly tires as a result of increasing concern about a worsening of the global environment.
Low rolling resistance, or low fuel consumption, can be an important performance factor for environmentally friendly tires. At the same time, however, it may be desirable for grip performance, particularly grip performance on wet road surfaces, to be equivalent or greater than that of conventional tires in order to ensure safety. (Grip performance on wet road surfaces can also be representative of acceleration and braking performance). However, low rolling resistance and grip performance can be conflicting performance goals and achieving both can be a technically difficult issue.
The present inventors have observed that, for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application No. 2009-138157, an aromatic modified terpene resin can be compounded to achieve an object of improving wet grip performance.